Some of my favorite authors have May book releases. I’m excited about this month of reading. I hope you find something you’re excited about. If not, don’t forget to go back and check the April releases. https://tinyurl.com/32mhhcje

Lots of books to anticipate. Let’s jump right in.

I think Margie may have already mentioned Kelley Armstrong’s fifth Rip Through Time novel, An Ordinary Sort of Evil. Modern-day homicide detective Mallory Mitchell has grown accustomed to life in Victorian Scotland after travelling 150 years into the past into the body of a housemaid. She’s built a new life for herself. Even though she works as an assistant to forensic-science pioneer Dr. Duncan Gray and Detective Hugh McCreadie, she considers them true friends. And with Gray in particular, perhaps, someday, something more. Late one night, Gray and Mallory are summoned urgently to the home of Lady Adler, a patron of Gray’s undertaking business, and they assume there’s been a death in the household. But instead, they arrive in the midst of a seance with a ghost demanding Gray’s presence. The ghost is Lady Adler’s former maid, who had gone missing but now requests that Gray investigate her murder. Although Gray and Mallory are skeptical, they agree to look into the matter, whether she’s dead or alive. (Release date is May 19.)

James Byrne’s Dez Limerick is back in his fourth adventure, Storm Warning. (Yay!) Desmond Aloysius Limerick―’Dez’ to all who know him―is a man with a shadowy past, certain hard-to-replicate skills, and a reputation as a good man to have when the going gets tough. Dez is doing his best to enjoy his retirement, wandering the country, doing what interests him, and occasionally helping friends when they find themselves needing any of his particular skills―mundane or extraordinary. For Dez was trained as a ‘gatekeeper’ – someone who can open any door, keep it open, and control who does and does not go through. It’s those skills that are now in demand when the State Department comes calling looking for his help. A multinational scientific research facility on the coast of Newfoundland has gone dark, the facility on full lockdown, and no one can get in or out. No one knows what is going on, but it can’t be good. And a close friend of Dez is presumed locked inside the facility along with everyone else. (Release date is May 26.)

From Janet Skeslien Charles, the New York Times bestselling author of The Paris Library and Miss Morgan’s Book Brigade, comes The Parisian Chapter, a charming and “richly populated” (New York Journal of Books) novel about two small-town girls with big dreams who move to Paris to become artists. But dreams don’t just come true. They require nurturing, as do friendships.
Paris, 1995: It’s been five years since Lily Jacobsen and her best friend Mary Louise arrived in Paris from their small town of Froid, Montana. Determined to establish themselves as artists, they shared a tiny walkup and survived on brie and baguettes. But when Mary Louise abruptly moves out, Lily feels alone in the city of light for the first time and needs a new way to support herself. She lands a job as a programs manager at the American Library in Paris, following in the footsteps of Odile, her beloved French neighbor in Montana who told her stories of heroic World War II librarians when Lily was growing up. At work, Lily meets an extraordinary cast of characters—including her favorite writer, struggling students, haughty trustees, and devoted volunteers—each with their own stories…and agendas. In the library’s attic, Lily discovers a box of archives that may be a link to Odile’s own Parisian chapter. (Release date is May 5.)

Rooted in memory and steeped in magic, L.C. Chu’s  The Library of Flowers is a radiant exploration of family, identity, and the expectations we inherit, perfect for anyone who has ever carried the weight of a legacy―and dared to make it their own.For centuries, the Hua women have held sway over the courts of emperors and billionaires with their magical perfumes able to stir hearts and ensure fortunes. And in every fifth generation, an eldest daughter is born with the rarest gift of all: the ability to summon true love. As a long-awaited fifth daughter, Lucy was supposed to be the miracle her exacting mother had been waiting for. But when her magic failed, Lucy fled Vancouver, her legacy, and the expectations that had nearly broken her. Now, years later, she runs a tiny perfume shop tucked away in Toronto’s Kensington Market―crafting beautiful, perfectly ordinary scents and keeping her extraordinary past firmly behind her. That is, until a death in the family brings her home…and saddles her with an unwelcome inheritance: the centuries-old Hua family register, brimming with secrets, formulas, and forgotten truths. As Lucy unravels the stories of the women who came before her―including the mother whose complicated heart she never could understand―she must confront the tangled threads of love, power, and identity…and ask herself whether her magic was ever truly gone, or simply waiting for her to decide for herself what it means to be a daughter of the House of Hua. (Release date is May 5.)

If you read Michael Connelly’s first Catalina novel, Nightshade, you’re probably waiting for Ironwood. Detective Sergeant Stilwell knows that his posting on Catalina Island is no paradise, but to most residents, it seems blissfully separated—by twenty-two miles of ocean—from the troubles of Los Angeles County. But now a threat is coming to his safe haven. Acting on a tip from a confidential informant, Stilwell and his deputies watch a plane land in the middle of the night at the Airport in the Sky, a remote airstrip in the mountains. A duffel bag of drugs is dropped and the deputies move in, but things quickly go sideways. While Stilwell chases the fleeing pickup man into the mountainside brush, shots are fired on the runway and the plane flies off. An internal inquiry follows, putting Stilwell on the bench until he is cleared of responsibility for the disastrous operation. But he is determined to find out who brought deadly violence to his island, and begins his own secret investigation into the drug deal gone wrong. (Release date is May 19.)

Portia Elan’s Homebound involves five interlocking lives. One beloved story. A dazzling adventure across centuries and continents in search of the things that hold us together. It’s 1983 and Becks can’t wait to get the hell out of Cincinnati. She’s nineteen, blasting her Walkman, and hiding from the fact that her beloved uncle, the only person who understood her, is dead. But she has work to do: he left her a half-finished game to complete—one last collaboration to find her way out of loneliness. Little does she know, what Becks is making will echo far into the future and shape the lives of a scientist, a sentient automaton, and a flinty sea captain in ways she cannot imagine. All are bound together by their search for connection—and by a futuristic traveler on a mysterious mission through space. (Release date is May 5.)

Alex Finlay’s latest thriller is The Anniversary. Every May 1st, a serial killer stalks a small town. Every year he comes for them . . On May 1, 1992, Jules Delaney and Quinn Riley hardly know each other. Jules is high school queen bee in a small Midwestern town when she survives a brutal attack by the elusive May Day Killer―a predator who strikes every May 1st and then vanishes without a trace. Quinn, a boy from the wrong side of the tracks, is arrested the same night after trying to break up a fight and nearly killing someone. By morning, their lives are forever connected.A year later, Jules is haunted by trauma and guilt, tormented by one question: Why was she spared? Quinn is newly released from juvenile detention and returns home to devastating news―the unsolved murder of his mother. Over the next decade, their lives are revisited on a single day each year: May 1st. As the years pass, secrets surface, lies unravel, and the paths of Jules and Quinn draw closer together. Two mysteries edge toward the truth―what really happened the night Jules was attacked, and who murdered Quinn’s mother? All the while, the May Day Killer is still out there. (Release date is May 12.)

If they can make a movie called “The Sheep Detectives”, why not a book about a dog detective? That’s Andrea Hairston’s The Redemption Center is Closed on Sundays. Every Sunday, Oona the St. Berdoodle and her current owner, Zsuzsu, make their way through the winding paths of the State Park to the enigmatic Redemption Center―a place often mistaken for a haunted mansion. When a local celebrity is found murdered, the unexpected brings Oona together with a rag-tag group of local misfits. Together they venture into the depths of the Center’s mystery to untangle the threads of murder and deception. But Oona holds two secrets: she’s a citizen of the multiverse, able to travel between dimensions at will, and more importantly, she knows the killer’s identity. Unfortunately, the killer knows she knows, and he’s determined to find her and silence her for good. An extra-dimensional murder mystery with conundrums, alien tricksters, and a dog detective who just doesn’t know the meaning of “stay”. (Release date is May 26.)

Deadly Force is Cynthia Harrod-Eagles’ twenty-sixth Inspector Bill Slider mystery (love this series!). ‘When it’s one of your own, you pull out all the stops.’ DCI Bill Slider and his team are plunged into a city-wide manhunt when the body of a police officer is found dumped in a canal. Murder is always treated seriously, but when the victim is a serving copper, the killer is going to find the whole London force on their tail – and there will be no let up until they’re caught. Colleagues say PC Peter Bentley was a quiet bloke who kept himself to himself. But as Slider and Atherton dig deeper, it becomes clear that this likeable bobby had secrets. Was he involved in something that got out of control or had something from his past come back to bite him? (Release date is May 5.)

Steven F. Havill’s twenty-eighth Posadas County mystery, Reverse, features a joy ride turned fatal and a community rocked by loss.  A road to nowhere . . .Recovering from a near-death collision with a giant elk, Undersheriff Estelle Reyes-Guzman is back to finish her last month at the Posadas County sheriff’s office. It’s supposed to be a quiet road to retirement, until a body is found at the bottom of a water-filled quarry. The barely alive figure of the grandson of the wealthiest man in town also lies further down the ravine. Figuring out what really happened is going to take everything that Estelle and her understaffed, overworked team have. Especially when there’s a vandal on the loose targeting the local airfield and the department has its own internal issues wreaking havoc. Plunged into another tricky investigation, one Estelle hopes will be her last, she can’t help but think her retirement can’t come soon enough . . . (Release date is May 5.)

I always like to point out the debut novels. In Andrew Dana Hudson’s Absence, a gripping, moving, and genre-blending speculative debut, the world is unraveling from an epidemic of human vanishing. Two rookie agents from the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs are dispatched to small-town Kansas to investigate a woman who claims to have returned from Spontaneous Human Absence, offering answers that could change everything. People are “popping.” Disappearing, one by one, into thin air. A global cataclysm known as Spontaneous Human Absence. In a world where prospects for survival are increasingly grim, hopelessness prevails, political rifts widen, and doomsday predictions flourish. Harvey Ellis works the night shift for the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs, an ad hoc federal agency meant to contain and catalog the crisis. Harvey’s job: to investigate claims of Absence, and, if validated, issue a standard government stipend to boost morale. Still recovering from losses of his own, Harvey is content in his routine—until his life is shaken by an unexpected assignment from the central office. A woman long thought Absent has reappeared in her hometown of Dawnville, Kansas, claiming she’s been to the other side and back. But is her wild and irresistible account true, or is she just the latest false prophet, offering hope to a world desperate for it? Together with his no-BS partner, Shonda Erins, Harvey travels to Dawnville to find out. (Release date is May 5.)

I’ve already heard from Kevin Tipple that Craig Johnson’s latest Longmire novel, The Brothers McKay, is a good one. When Pepper McKay, one of the most hated men in Absaroka County, is found murdered on his ranch in Crazy Woman Canyon, suspects aren’t in short supply. But Sheriff Walt Longmire’s attention is on those who had gathered for a family meeting that evening, McKay’s very different sons: a smooth-talking charmer, a cosmopolitan journalist, a reclusive monk, and a half-Native ranch hand who keeps the place running. Each had a motive. Each claims he’s innocent. As Walt investigates what happened that night at the O-Kay Lodge, he’s pulled into a tangle of old grudges and long-buried secrets. Then the case takes a sharp turn: a second body surfaces, and a wildfire tears through the canyon, trapping Walt and forcing him into a fight for his life as both the killer and the elements close in. (Release date is May 26.)

What can be more of a contrast to The Brothers McKay than Rachel Linden’s A Sprinkle of Sweet Serendipity? Paris trained chocolatier and single mother Emmie Wynne gave up her own dreams six years ago when she returned to her Pacific Northwest coastal tourist town to run her family’s struggling candy store. Now on her thirty-fourth birthday, Emmie has only one wish, to be granted the vision that every Wynne woman is given once in her lifetime—a shimmering glimpse of her true destiny. This year, when she blows out her candles, it finally comes true. Her vision is more delectable than she could’ve imagined—her very own artisanal chocolate shop filled with decadent truffles and caramels, and her celebrity crush, Henry Summers, down on one knee. And when Henry suddenly arrives in town for the summer, offering Emmie the opportunity of a lifetime, the future in her vision suddenly seems possible. But a rekindled connection with Jakob, her former high school best friend turned hunky, brooding tattooed baker, forces Emmie to grapple with the bittersweet realization that her destiny may not be what her heart truly longs for. As the culmination of her vision draws nearer, can Emmie find the courage to create a happiness of her own making? (Release date is May 19.)

Rachel Mills’ The Players Club is a debut about a secret club of women who risk everything to ask the question: If you could be anyone…who would you dare to become? Beth Greenwood has spent her life playing it safe. She’s been a graphic designer at the same company for a decade, she dutifully meets men from the apps for dinner and sometimes casual sex, she thinks about decorating her sterile, small apartment. Her comfort and joy are her Sunday catch-ups with her sister Elspeth, whose perfect life, very different from Beth’s, has recently started to unravel. One day, Beth meets a woman who invites her to join a secret club. It’s not knitting or books; it’s living out an experience you’ve always wanted to have. Cirque du Soleil acrobat, gonzo graffiti artist, performer in the BDSM underground scene: these women will get you everything you need in order to—temporarily—be the person you might have been, had your life taken one or two different turns. At first Beth is dazzled by her new friendships and the opportunity they offer her to test the boundaries of her identity, to escape from her quiet, ordinary life. But even the best of clubs can offer only so much distraction, and when the stakes of Beth’s real life become uncomfortably high, she must ask herself, really and truly, who she’s going to choose to be, and who is going to nurture her when she needs it most. (Release date is May 19.)

I love the cover and description of Joshua Moehling’s fourth Ben Packard novel, Beneath a Broken Sky. Now, I’m going to have to go back and look for the first in the series. It’s a tense, atmospheric thriller about one detective’s search for a mysterious killer in the chaos following a deadly storm… It’s a hot, miserable summer in the small town of Sandy Lake. Detective Ben Packard has settled into his life here just in time for a tornado to sweep through the county, causing irreparable damage. Trees are felled, homes destroyed, and people are desperate. Worse, the winds have blown in a group of storm chasers with something to hide. When a mother unpopular among locals for raising hell on behalf of her bullied gay son is killed in her home, there’s almost too many suspects to count. For Ben Packard, the case is personal. And when someone from his past shows up on his doorstep out of the blue, he realizes he’ll have to confront the reality of navigating life as a gay man in a small town bent on tradition, no matter the cost. The heat suffocates. The violence simmers. Before the summer is out, someone else will die. (Release date is May 26.)

Return to Ravensea Castle, a haunted castle turned B&B in Elizabeth Penney’s Dungeons and Danger. As Halloween approaches, Ravensea Castle is bustling with excitement as Nora Asquith welcomes the fall season guests to her family’s newly converted bed and breakfast. A historian studying the movements of the Vikings has traced their exploits to Ravensea. A certain Viking woman, known as the Red Maiden, landed here and the historian believes she buried a treasure hoard before the castle was built. He is hopeful he can find the hoard now. Nora can’t help but wonder if the enigmatic castle ghost she’s always referred to as the woman in red could be this very Viking? Meanwhile, a team of four ghost hunters is coming to stay at Ravensea for the filming of Britain’s Got Ghosts. Former students of the historian, the group arrives with their own rivalries and baggage. They try to see who can make the most paranormal contacts and end up getting more than they bargained for. (Release date is May 26.)

Louise Penny teams up with Mellissa Fung for The Last Mandarin. A mother and a daughter race against time in this all-too-real thriller that reaches from Tiananmen Square all the way to the White House. Alice Li, a first-generation Chinese American and former food blogger, has long lived in the shadow of her mother, Vivien Li― a Tiananmen Square dissident turned world-renowned human rights activist and passionate advocate for a free and democratic China. When security and fire alarms go off simultaneously all around the world, setting off a panic, the signal is traced back to China. As world leaders scramble to respond, Vivien and Alice are called to the White House in hopes Madame Li can interpret the Chinese intentions. But why involve Alice? If China isn’t behind the attack, Vivien warns, someone even more dangerous is pulling the strings. Mother and daughter must join together to overcome their estrangement if they have any hope of preventing global catastrophe. From DC to Ohio to Hong Kong, they work to prevent the next attack, along the way decoding an ancient legend and uncovering a secret language invented by women, for women. (Release date is May 12.)

Danielle Postel-Vinay’s Murder Most Delicious sounds scrumptious. In Paris, murder is a dish best served with chocolate éclairs. Starting over in Paris was supposed to be the opportunity of a lifetime for American sommelier Olivia Beech—until her dream job ends in murder. Once a rising star in the wine world, Olivia was one of a handful of women in the world to hold the distinction of being a Master Sommelier before COVID stole her sense of taste—and her career. Adrift and depressed, she gets a second chance when beloved celebrity chef Jacques de Bizet invites her to Paris for a job interview. But as the interview begins, he collapses, poisoned, making Olivia the prime suspect. Olivia is in trouble, but she has an advantage: her extraordinary nose is still sharp enough to detect the subtlest of scents, including the poison that killed Jacques. Olivia knows she’s innocent, but how can she prove it? Enter the Paris Neighborhood Watch, an eccentric circle of locals determined to protect their quartier. At the helm is the mysterious Augusta Dupin, a brilliant but agoraphobic detective, aided by her intuitive British shorthair cat, Chateaubriand. Olivia and Augusta join forces with a group of neighborhood amateur sleuths—a pâtissier, a café owner, a part-time librarian, a florist and a kind-hearted cop who may be falling for Olivia—to solve the crime, a search that helps them find not only the killer but fresh purpose in their lives. (Release date is May 26.)

Shaina Steinberg’s third Bishop and Gallagher mystery is Echoes of Infamy. In late-1940s Los Angeles, former spies Evelyn Bishop and Nick Gallagher dig into shady real estate dealings, murder, and the appalling aftereffects of WWII-era Japanese American internment in this intrigue-filled historical mystery. (Release date is May 26)

Something for everyone except nonfiction readers. Thrillers, mysteries, romance, paranormal, literary fiction. Let me know what I missed with the May releases.